Death Blow

As Lawrence Martin ably chronicles in Harperland, one of the missions of Prime Minister Stephen Harper's political life is to destroy the Liberal Party of Canada. Mr. Harper would rather see clear left-right showdowns in Canada, than the re-emergence of Liberals governing from the mushy middle. He wants a permanent realignment of the Canadian political narrative, and this only works if he can marginalize the Liberals for good. To me, it looks as if Mr. Harper has set himself up to take his best shot yet.

There are several moving parts to the strategy, but central to it all is starving the Liberals of funding. As the narrative goes, the Liberals are devoid of ideas and principles, so without funding they will implode. Cutting off substantial funding is to be accomplished by removing the taxpayer subsidy for political parties.

The Liberals rely on this subsidy heavily since their donor base is more narrow than that of either the Conservatives or the NDP, and the Liberals can only raise limited funds from this narrow base because of ceilings on individual donor contributions. Mr. Harper reiterated this week his opposition to the public funding of political parties. It is one of small collection of well-defined policy differences between himself and Liberal Leader Michael Ignatieff. For Harper this is a point of principle. For Ignatieff it is desperate self-interest.

Many pundits believe Mr. Harper would never be foolish enough to try again to do away with the subsidy, after almost losing his government over it in 2008. This amateur pundit sees reason to think not only that he will try again, but that he may succeed this time. This is because he will try to enlist the support of the New Democratic Party to do it.

Now, the NDP probably always has, and definitely always will support public financing of political parties. But it is also a fact that the NDP is currently hurt by the subsidy in Canada because of the financial strength it gives to the Green Party. Imagine a scenario in which, on a one-time basis, the NDP supports a budget that includes the removal of the subsidy.  The Greens would be catastrophically de-funded (sort of like Larry Smith), depriving them of their publicly-funded advertising and travel budgets. The Liberals would be similarly hamstrung. The NDP, with the strongest grassroots fundraising machine of the parties to the left of Harper, would be best positioned to take advantage. Even under a scenario whereby the subsidy is restored later by a future government, the more viable NDP would have meanwhile taken more ground on the left, appearing more and more like a genuine governing alternative, and making the Greens a less-attractive anachronism to left-leaning voters.

It is not an insignificant point that all federalist parties (and all of confederation) would benefit by the parallel weakening of the Bloc Quebecois that would also result from the removal of the subsidy. In Quebec, even the Liberals might benefit (no plan is perfect).

It's been noted lately that the barbs between Mr. Harper and Mr. Layton have been less pointed than usual, leading to speculation that a deal may be in the works to keep the government alive for perhaps another year, stemming from NDP support for the upcoming budget.

What could lead the NDP to support the budget? Any number of things, but it would have to be something big. Most likely it would be something to do with pensions, seniors more broadly, or something along the lines of the guaranteed income schemes lately discussed by Senators Hugh Segal and Art Eggleton, specifically targeting low-income households.

Under any such scenario, would Mr. Layton be able to claim he'd extracted a major concession from the Conservatives (helpfully providing him cover for supporting a budget that axed the party subsidy, something he and Mr. Harper are best positioned to weather). This move would also prolong the tenure of Michael Ignatieff as Liberal Leader. As one commentator has pointed out, Ignatieff is the "gift that keeps on giving" to Mr. Layton. Mr. Ignatieff is simply not an attraction for left-leaning voters, so the longer he stays in his current post, the better for the NDP as it covers them on that flank.

It's already clear that the Liberals will not support the next federal budget. Clear differences (though minor ones) are finally emerging between the Conservatives and the Liberals on a few files.  This has led to much speculation about a Spring election, but the problem for Mr. Ignatieff is that he can not bring down the government alone. There seem to be ample reasons for the NDP to want things to continue as they are, and even to facilitate the removal of the public subsidy for parties, especially since all three of their rivals to the left of the Conservatives would be disadvantaged, in comparison with themselves, in the process.

If there has ever been a moment in contemporary politics when the federal Liberals were mortally vulnerable, and when the possibility existed for the NDP to emerge as a genuine opposition to the government, it is now. Watch for the death blow.